I got some readin' to do

Take a look at this list of Great American Novels, as propounded by the editors of Atlantic Magazine. Let me know what you think. 

Being a sucker for any best-of list, I was naturally curious to see how many of these 136 books I’ve read. I’ve gone through the list twice now and still count only 23! This can’t be right!

I guess this is what happens when you read way too many best-selling crime novels. A lot of Really Important books fall by the wayside.

About the list: The books had to be published in the United States during the last 100 years, and they had to be recommended by a group of scholars, critics and novelists.  The list came to 136 because The Atlantic thought an arbitrary number would be too, well, arbitrary. 

Anyway, if I’m going to take this list seriously, that means I’ll have to find space for, let’s see, 113 Great American Novels that I’ve heretofore overlooked. I’m going to need a bigger nightstand.

Not that it matters, but here are the listed books I have read:

• A Farewell to Arms
• The Great Gatsby
• The Big Sleep
• The Grapes of Wrath
• Catcher in the Rye
• Charlotte’s Web
• Fahrenheit 451
• The Haunting of Hill House
• Catch-22
• A Wrinkle in Time
• One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest
• Slaughterhouse 5
• Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
• The Stand
• The Dog of the South
• Blood Meridian
• The Secret History
• The Shipping News
• The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
• A Visit From the Goon Squad
• The Sympathizer
• Lincoln in the Bardo
• Severance

A few of the above I didn’t think of as particularly great at the time. In fact, if I made my own Great American Novel list, I’m not sure I could think of more than about 50, some of which Atlantic’s experts did not choose.

But the whole point of lists like this is to get people thinking about what makes something great, as opposed to merely good. It also doesn’t hurt to be reminded of the hundred or so classics you never got around to reading.